Material or load handling vehicles such as refuse vehicles, concrete placement vehicles, and container or pallet handling vehicles include a number of subsystems that allow the vehicles to perform their intended functions. Typically, these subsystems are hardwired to a central control system such as a user interface, where an operator may control the subsystems. Hardwiring each subsystem throughout the vehicle to a central control system may result in several operational problems. For example, a completely hardwired system may increase spatial requirements for positioning the system, in addition to making other components or subsystems more difficult to access. Further, the number and length of wires present in a hardwired system may make diagnosis of a wiring problem difficult to locate. Additionally, a hardwired system will typically increase production costs in the form of materials and labor.
In addition to controlling vehicle subsystems, a central control can also operate to communicate information (e.g. diagnostic information) about a vehicle and its subsystems to an operator at a storage or maintenance location (e.g. central garage, fleet location, batch plant, central data center, etc.) typically this requires having an operator get inside the truck and plug in a status code reading device. The device may then tell the operator the status of various vehicle subsystems or the vehicle itself may indicate a status to the operator. Having an operator manually check each of the vehicles may take a significant amount of time and be cost ineffective.
Thus there is a need for a wireless vehicle control system that reduces the large amount of wiring that is typically run throughout a material or load handling vehicle, in order to control the vehicle subsystems. There is also a need for a control system on an material or load handling vehicle that is capable of sending the vehicle and subsystems status to a remote monitoring system so that vehicle information may be quickly and easily collected at a location remote from the vehicle.